Former Alpine Racer Esteban Ocon Criticizes Team for Demoting Jack Doohan

In a surprising move, the Formula 1 team Alpine has demoted driver Jack Doohan back to a reserve role just six races into the 2025 season. This decision comes after promoted Doohan to a race seat at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix last year, replacing Esteban Ocon who gave up his drive to participate in post-season testing with his new team, Haas.

The Rise and Fall of Jack Doohan

Despite being given a full-time seat for 2025, rumors of Doohan’s potential demotion circulated before the season even began. After six pointless races, Doohan was replaced by Franco Colapinto, struggling to match his experienced teammate Pierre Gasly.

That’s always quite surprising to see, for sure,” Ocon told Canal+ in Imola. “If I look at it from Jack’s standpoint, over five races, I think he showed decent speed, he showed things that mean he deserves at least to show a little bit more.

Ocon expressed his concern about the impact of such a decision on Doohan’s career, stating, “It’s difficult for him. You ruin a driver’s career when you do something like that – though his career is far from over, I believe he’ll be back in F1 one day, he’s got potential. But people don’t realize drivers work their whole lives to get to that moment, and giving us five races like that, that’s not normal.

Alpine’s Questionable Management Practices

The handling of Alpine‘s driver line-up and the team’s revolving door of principals, technical directors, and senior staff over the last few years has been a subject of debate.

Anyway, that’s nothing new unfortunately,” Ocon lamented. “There are few seats in F1. Franco deserves to be in F1 too, for sure, but that’s not the right way to do it.